Glasgow

24 August 2002
OVER 200 people gathered outside Scotland's national football stadium, Hampden Park, in Glasgow on Friday of last week to protest at next month's under-21 football match between Scotland and Israel.

24 August 2002
HUNDREDS OF health workers packed into a social club in the East End of Glasgow last Friday evening. The celebration had been organised to mark a stunning victory. Over 300 health workers at the city's Glasgow Royal Infirmary took on the multinational firm Sodexho, which runs support services at the hospital, and won.

17 August 2002
DEFIANT STRIKES by 300 workers at Glasgow Royal Infirmary have defeated Sodexho, a brutal multinational that operates in 72 countries. The inspiring news came through on Monday that six days of strikes had forced massive concessions from the firm.

17 August 2002
We're more angry than ever before
THE ANTI-war mood in Glasgow and across Scotland is growing daily and not just among the usual suspects. For years the Muslim community has been considered quiet and respectable, playing little or no role in active politics.

10 August 2002
ABOUT 300 workers employed by the private contractor Sodexho at Glasgow Royal Infirmary struck for three days this week over pay. This follows a two-day strike last week. Strikers picketed the hospital enthusiastically and showed they are solidly behind the strike. One of the pickets told Socialist Worker, "We're sick of low pay and being pushed around by this management. Those on strike are porters, domestics, and catering and security staff. We are an important part of the NHS and we deserve to get a decent rate of pay."

10 August 2002
THE TRIALS have started of people who were arrested during the Govanhill pool protests in Glasgow last year. In an effort to stop the immensely popular pool from being closed by the city council, local people and their supporters occupied the facility. On 7 August last year sheriff officers backed by police began removing people from the building. People rushed on to the streets to protest and were eventually met by charges from mounted police.

03 August 2002
THE NATIONAL president of the EIS-CLA, the Scottish further education lecturers' union, was sacked last week from his job at Glasgow's Central College of Commerce. Jim O'Donovan had been suspended on full pay following a disciplinary hearing at the end of last term.

27 July 2002
AROUND 200 workers at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary could be on strike next week. The planned action follows a 95 percent vote for action. The porters, domestics, security and catering workers are employed by Sodexho. This company made money from the asylum voucher system. It pays workers at the infirmary as little as £4.10 an hour.

27 July 2002
OVER 5,000 firefighters and control room staff marched in Glasgow on Monday as part of the Britain-wide campaign over pay. It was a brilliantly colourful and noisy protest with big delegations from London, Yorkshire, Cornwall, Ireland and many other places. Many of those present said that it was "not like a trade union demo-it was more like the sort of thing they do in Europe".

13 July 2002
THE NATIONAL president of the Scottish lecturers' union, the EIS-CLA, is the latest union activist to be targeted by management at further education colleges in Scotland. Jim O'Donovan has been suspended from his lecturing post at the Glasgow Central College of Commerce.

29 June 2002
THREE THOUSAND people marched in Scotland's annual lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender demonstration-Pride Scotland-last Saturday in Glasgow. The joyous, celebratory march was made up of people of all ages from all over Scotland. Floats, banners and costumes made this one of the most colourful demonstrations Glasgow has seen for a while.

15 June 2002
IN A disgraceful attempt at union busting, Glasgow's Labour council has hired scab labour to break an official strike. Last weekend council officials hired the private firm Scotia Security. Along with senior managers, they were used to break the strike by 140 low paid Unison staff who work for the city's leisure and recreation service. The strikers asked council workers in other unions to respect their picket lines on Saturday and Sunday.

04 May 2002
PROTESTS AND meetings in support of Palestine took place around Britain last week. A superb 5,000 people joined the Scottish Coalition for Justice not War demonstration in Glasgow last Saturday. Feeder marches from Southside and the West End of the city arrived in George Square to huge applause from fellow demonstrators.

27 April 2002
Saturday 27 April
No to war on Iraq, justice for Palestine. Demonstrate, 11am, George Square, Glasgow. Speakers include George Galloway and Tommy Sheridan. Called by Scottish Coalition for Justice Not War.

20 April 2002
LONDON AND Glasgow are not yet Rome and Barcelona. Nor is Britain yet seeing the kind of militant industrial struggle witnessed in the Italian general strike on Tuesday. Italian workers are fighting the government of Tony Blair's right wing friend Silvio Berlusconi, who is pushing through a major attack on workers' rights. But Britain is not immune from the mood of resistance.

13 April 2002
Domestics and porters at Glasgow Royal Infirmary won a swift and important victory on Tuesday of last week over the multinational company Sodexho. Some 120 workers, members of the Unison union, walked out in a mass unofficial protest.

16 March 2002
This month sees key battles in a largely unreported war over the future of one of the pillars of the welfare state. Tenants of Britain's two biggest landlords, Birmingham and Glasgow councils, will vote on New Labour plans to hand their homes to private housing companies. Thousands of tenants in Crewe are already voting in a similar ballot, and Bradford council tenants will also vote this month.

02 March 2002
The close vote on privatisation at the Scottish Labour Party conference last weekend underlined the depths of opposition to policies like handing council homes to private companies. The vote came just after a significant minority of the ruling Labour group of councillors in Glasgow voted against the plan to go ahead with a ballot on privatising the city's more than 80,000 council homes.